Loving kindness meditation metta in five stages, with phrases on screen

What is loving-kindness meditation?

Loving-kindness meditation is the practice of silently repeating wishes such as "may you be happy" or "may you be free from suffering", directed in turn at yourself, people you love, people you hardly know, people you find difficult and finally all beings. The aim is not to force a feeling. You repeat the words, notice what happens in the body and the mind, and repeat them again.

The Pali word mettā (Sanskrit maitrī) means benevolence, loving-kindness or friendliness. In the practice, the friendliness you would feel towards a good friend is extended step by step to people who are not friends at all.

This sets metta apart from most other techniques on this site. Breath counting and the body scan train attention on a neutral object; metta uses attention too, but its object is a person and a wish. For some people, a phrase gives a restless mind something more concrete to hold than the breath.

Where does metta come from? The Metta Sutta and the Brahmaviharas

Metta comes from early Buddhism, where it is the first of the four Brahmavihāras, the "divine abodes". It is praised in the Mettā Sutta, also called the Karaṇīya Mettā Sutta, a short discourse in the Sutta Nipāta (1.8).

The method of moving from oneself to loved ones, neutral people, difficult people and all beings is the traditional sequence, though teachers and schools vary it: some begin with a benefactor rather than with oneself, some add more categories, some use different phrases.

Metta also has a fixed place in modern retreat practice. In the 10-day Vipassana courses taught in the tradition of S. N. Goenka, students spend most of the course observing the breath and body sensations, and on the last full day they learn loving-kindness meditation, according to the official course description on dhamma.org.

How to do loving-kindness meditation step by step

To do loving-kindness meditation, sit comfortably, close your eyes, and silently repeat a few kind phrases for one person at a time, moving through five people or groups. The timer above runs this sequence in 15 minutes: five stages of 3 minutes, with the phrases for each stage on screen and a chime when it is time to move on.

• Settle in. Sit on a chair or cushion with your back upright but not stiff. Let the breath be natural. The 10-second countdown is for this.
• Stage 1, yourself. Bring yourself to mind as you are right now and repeat: may I be at peace, may I be well, may I be at ease. Say the words slowly, with a pause after each one.
• Stage 2, someone dear. Picture a person you love without complications: a friend, a grandparent, a child. Repeat the same phrases with "you": may you be at peace, may you be well, may you be at ease.
• Stage 3, someone neutral. Choose a person you see but do not really know, such as a neighbour, a cashier or a bus driver. Wish them the same.
• Stage 4, someone difficult. Choose a person you find irritating or hard to be around. At first, pick a mildly difficult person, not the one who hurt you most.
• Stage 5, everyone. Widen the wish to all people and all beings: may all beings be at peace and at ease.
• Close. When the final bell sounds, sit for a few breaths before you open your eyes and notice how you feel, without judging it.

If your mind wanders, which it will, notice where it went and return to the phrase you were on. Wandering is part of the practice, not a failure of it.

Loving-kindness meditation phrases: what to say

The phrases are short, simple wishes of goodwill; the classic examples are "may you be happy" and "may you be free from suffering". There is no single correct wording, and traditions differ. What matters is that the words feel sincere to you and are easy to repeat silently.

The timer uses three calm phrases that work for most people, and you can replace them with your own:

Three or four phrases are enough. Long lists turn into recitation, and the point is to mean each line. The later stages use a single phrase on purpose: with a neutral or difficult person, one wish you can actually say is better than four you cannot.

Benefits of loving-kindness meditation: what the research shows

The clearest research finding is that loving-kindness meditation increases everyday positive emotions by a medium amount. A meta-analysis in Frontiers in Psychology (Zeng and colleagues, 2015) pooled 24 studies with 1,759 participants and found medium effect sizes on daily positive emotions and small to large effects on positive emotions right after practice.

A second meta-analysis, in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (Galante and colleagues, 2014), looked at 22 randomised trials of kindness-based meditation and broader health and well-being outcomes. The main results are in the table.

Two cautions apply. Against active comparisons the Galante results were inconclusive, and the authors rated study quality low to moderate, with small samples and wide confidence intervals. An earlier narrative review (Hofmann, Grossman and Hinton, 2011, Clinical Psychology Review) reached a similar picture: more positive and less negative emotion, and only preliminary evidence on stress responses and on brain areas linked to empathy.

Does loving-kindness meditation make you happier over time?

In the best-known field study, loving-kindness meditation made people happier day to day, and those daily gains built up over weeks. Barbara Fredrickson and colleagues at the University of North Carolina recruited 139 working adults and randomly assigned half of them to start loving-kindness meditation; the rest waited.

The practice increased daily positive emotions over time. Those emotions, in turn, increased what the authors called personal resources: mindfulness, a sense of purpose in life, social support and fewer symptoms of illness. These resources then predicted higher life satisfaction and fewer depressive symptoms. The authors titled the paper "Open hearts build lives" (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2008).

The study shows a chain, not a single jump: small, repeated positive moments add up. That fits the practical advice of a short daily session rather than an occasional long one.

How long should loving-kindness meditation be?

A loving-kindness session of 10 to 20 minutes is a practical length, and research suggests that doing it regularly matters more than doing it for long. In the Zeng meta-analysis, neither the length of the programme nor the time participants spent meditating changed the size of the effect on positive emotions.

The timer's default is 15 minutes: 3 minutes per stage gives enough time to repeat the phrases slowly several times without the stage dragging. If 15 minutes is too much at first, shorten the session in the timer settings; if a stage feels rushed, lengthen it. Some people stay longer with the stage that is hardest for them, which is often themselves or the difficult person.

Why loving-kindness meditation can feel hard, and what to do

Loving-kindness meditation often feels awkward or even unpleasant at first, and the research says so directly: the authors of the Galante review wrote that exposure to kindness-based meditation "may initially be challenging for some people". The common difficulties are predictable.

Feeling nothing is the most common one. The words can sound empty. That is fine: the practice is the repetition and the intention, not a guaranteed warm feeling. Wishing yourself well can be the hardest stage of all; if it is, start with the person dear to you and come back to yourself at the end. A difficult person can bring up anger; if that happens, go back to someone neutral for a while, or choose a less difficult person next time.

Meditation in general is not free of side effects. In a 2020 review of 83 studies (Farias and colleagues, Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica), about 8% of participants reported an unpleasant effect, most often anxiety. If metta makes you feel worse, shorten the session, open your eyes or stop, and seek professional help if the distress continues.

Loving-kindness vs compassion meditation: what is the difference?

Loving-kindness meditation wishes others happiness and well-being, while compassion meditation focuses on others' suffering and the wish that it ends. The two are closely related and are often taught together, and the phrase "may you be free from suffering" sits on the border between them.

In the Zeng meta-analysis the difference showed up in the numbers: practices with a loving-kindness focus gave medium effects on positive emotions, and practices with a compassion focus gave small ones. That is one reason the timer uses wishes for peace, well-being and ease rather than phrases about pain.

Self-compassion is a related idea: treating yourself with the same kindness you would offer a friend. The first stage of metta is a direct way to practise it, and in the Galante review self-compassion rose by g = 0.45 compared with no practice.